Blue & Gold Jacket

The last week and a half have been spent working on a jacket. I've been collecting royal blue and gold metallic fabric for some time now, with a jacket in mind. It started with a gorgeous piece of Jacquard woven Japanese fabric in deep blue and gold. This turned out to be a problem fabric, as it shredded on the seam lines and was made of polyester so it wanted to shrink or melt when touched with an iron. I got a jacket pattern last time I went to the coast, called "Butterfly Jacket" by Ricki Bremer. I think I just bought it because I liked the fabric the sample was made out of. Also the raglan sleeves interested me, because every jacket I've tried on lately has been too tight on the upper arms. The sizes went up to 3x, so I got the pattern. It began with a muslin foundation to piece the patchwork onto, I cut up a bit of my fabric into 7" wide strips. It called for squares, but I cut mine anywhere from 4" to 9" long, to give more variety to the design. These were sewn into rows and then flip and sewn onto the muslin for stability and shaping. The pattern looked HUGE. It did not have several sizes, only a 16 and a 3XL "Goddess size," and I fell some where in between, maybe "Princess" size. So measuring at the hip, I decided to take out about 8", 2" each on the front panels and 4" on the back piece. It went together fairly easily, it even had a lining and one of my fabrics was a 4 yard piece, just enough. Well it did not fit well, frowny face, It was still too big, but the main problem was the raglan sleeves, just TOO much fabric "pooching" out all over.

So, I was unhappy with my efforts and the fit, just a waste of time and GOOD fabric. Several solutions are available, I can cut it apart and slim down the raglan sleeves, or get a different pattern and cut it from the excess of fabric in the jacket. I think the pieces are big enough to just cut out new pattern pieces. So I sit and wait as I make up my mind, but I hate to waste all that wonderful fabric.

This is one of the reasons I don't sew clothes for myself, I've made skirts and blouses before, and several quilted vests, which I had to tweak the pattern to fit. But clothes sewing is NOT my forte. I am so glad I did not cut up my hand dyed silk noil for this jacket. or do any embellishing or beading. The blue was good fabric but it still was a trial run before I cut up the silk.
On Friday I will link this post to Nina-Marie's "Off the Wall Friday" click on the link in the right hand column to see what other very talented artists are doing.